In September 2023 I had a delicious tortilla burger in a restaurant called Burger Berg in Děčín, Czechia, after a via ferrata experience on the Shepherd’s Wall. Since then I’ve occasionally fondly remembered the dish, but I’ve never before or since seen such a dish in any other restaurant. This week I finally decided to just go ahead and make my own tortilla burgers.

The following recipe serves two adults (two tortilla burgers each) and two kids (one tortilla burger each). The dish is great for small kids who might often struggle to keep all the ingredients inside a normal burger, but this one wraps them into a nice package. Here’s a photo of the original dish I had:

Tortilla burger in a restaurant.

Ingredients

The meat

  • 400 g minced meat (beef or mixed)
  • 1 small brown onion
  • 1–3 garlic cloves
  • 2 tablespoons of mustard
  • pinch of salt
  • pinch of pepper
  • powdered red pepper (or smoked paprika)

The other stuff

  • 6 large tortillas
  • 6 slices of cheddar cheese
  • 1 large tomato
  • burger sauce (mayo)
  • ketchup
  • some lettuce
  • pickles
  • some oil for cooking
  • fries
  • (Coke Zero for drinking)

Instructions

  1. Remember to put the fries into the oven at some point according to their specific cooking instructions.
  2. Chop the onion and the garlic fine.
  3. Mix with the minced meat. Add the salt, pepper, red pepper, and mustard too.
  4. Divide the meat into six equal pieces, then flatten them into steaks about 1 cm thick.
  5. Fry the steaks on a pan for roughly 8 minutes or until looking good.
  6. Slice the tomato.
  7. Apply burger sauce on the center of each tortilla, then circle the sauce with ketchup.
  8. Insert a steak on top of the sauce, rub it slightly against it to spread it evenly.
  9. Add a slice of tomato, a few pieces of lettuce, pickles, and a slice of cheddar.
  10. Wrap the tortillas snugly, then heat them on the pan for a minute or so to give them color and warmth.
  11. Serve immediately with fries and ketchup, and an ice cold Coke Zero.

This was a hit and I’ll be making these again. You could conceivably use many other ingredients too, besides the ones mentioned, but I wanted to keep this one simple. I imagine red onion, coleslaw, bacon, nachos, salsa, and pineapple would all fit nicely into a tortilla burger as well.

Finally, as a bonus, here’s a photo of me on that via ferrata:

Nice view.